Red Bull remain "absolutely confident" they will not fall foul of Formula 1 cost cap rules despite rumours to the contrary circling the paddock.
Last season, teams had to stick to a budget of $145m or risk sanctions from the sport's governing body. The FIA has been analysing each teams' submissions about their spending and is set to reveal the results on Wednesday.
But a few days before that public announcement, rumours began to swirl at the Singapore Grand Prix. It has been claimed that Red Bull and Aston Martin may have gone over the budget cap, though no evidence has been offered and both teams firmly deny that is the case.
Naturally, both Mercedes and Ferrari have called for hefty punishments to be handed out if Red Bull did indeed go over their budget. But Christian Horner said in Singapore that there will be no need as they believe they stuck to the rules.
"I'm absolutely confident in our submission," the team principal said. "It's been through a process. It went in in March, in terms of [being] signed off fully by our auditors who are obviously one of the big three. And we believe that we are comfortably within the cap. So the FIA are following their process. We expect hopefully, and potentially this week, to hear not just us, but all of the teams, the outcome of that process."
Despite that confidence, Horner admitted it will be interesting to see exactly how the FIA applies the cost cap rules for the first time. "These are a brand new set of regulations that are highly complicated, and that apply to companies of different structures, different formulations, and of course, regulations," he added.
"There's always different interpretations to those regulations. So in the first year, it will be very interesting to see how that is applied. We've seen clarifications, even since the submissions were made, that apply to last year. So it's always going to be a process of evolution.
"It's an enormous topic for the FIA to get their arms around, particularly when you look at the scale of the teams in the pit lane, many of which belong to even bigger conglomerates and organisations."
Aston Martin chief Mike Krack also protested his team's innocence and said he had not expected his team to be accused of breaching the rules. "It's a process where you give your submission, and then the FIA is analysing this, and comes back with questions," said the Luxembourger.
"And this process is still going on. So we don't really know what will be the result. There is a discussion going on. We have questions about interpretation, they have questions about interpretation. And we were surprised to read our name in this thing. So, let's see. We don't think that we have done anything majorly wrong."
